Angels and Anecdotes

"I was praying about it, and suddenly I heard God's voice just as plain as I'm hearing you, and he said....blah, blah, blah, blah, and blah."

"When my grandfather was dying, he looked over at something in the room and started smiling and I asked him what he was smiling about and he said he could see an angel!"

"I was having doubts about my faith and I went into my bedroom and for some reason I decided to clean out my closet. I hadn't planned on doing that at all, but I just suddenly felt like I needed to. And as I was taking junk out of the top shelf, I found an old bible! I knew that God had put the thought in my head that I needed to clean out that closet so I would run across the bible! I just knew it in my heart!"

"God put a burden on my heart to pray for So and So. I prayed for him and I found out the next day he had been in an accident! It was a miracle he wasn't badly hurt! I knew God had told me to pray for his safety!"

These are some of the anecdotes I've heard from people when they find out I'm atheist. They tell these stories as if it will make me suddenly think, "Wow! I am SO wrong about not believing a god exists!" As if that one story could tear apart the very fabric of my reality. As if it could undo the years of seeking knowledge about our world and universe and our origins and history and the evolution of religion and all the information I have accumulated that led to my rejection of supernatural claims. As if it could transcend my reason and critical thinking and erase everything I've learned in one fell swoop.

You can look in their eyes and know that if you said, "David Hume," they would have no idea who you are talking about. Or Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation. Or Australopithecus afarensis. Or Cassini. Or Aboigenesis. Or a strawman fallacy. Or Pascal's Wager. Or Botticelli. Or Franz Schubert. Or phylogeny. Or theoretical physics (or any physics), Or Thomas Paine. etc., etc......

So how do you even begin to comment on these anecdotes? How do you have a discussion about supernatural beliefs (or anything else) with people who don't care about anything outside their tiny fortresses of faith? I find myself starting to respond and then giving up before a single word comes out. It seems pointless and completely futile and so I end up keeping everything to myself. In my particular work environment and the area of the state where I live, these are my peers. It's almost like a scene from "The Village." Many of the folks never leave the county, much less the state. And no, I'm not kidding.

(I need to write another blog entitled, "How the Hell Did I Get HERE!"

Maybe I just need to move to the city.